


Three Long Years

by bicantankerousJinx



Series: After all this Time [1]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: AU in which the ship and the meteor collide before entering the new universe, Dorky teens doing the romance, F/M, That headcanon where Alternia has its own language, but its going back from the early mentions of like "frenemies" and such, macking will happen, well its not really a headcanon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-01
Updated: 2014-05-01
Packaged: 2018-01-21 12:36:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,443
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1550732
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bicantankerousJinx/pseuds/bicantankerousJinx
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>GG: three years huh?<br/>CG: YEAH<br/>GG: that sure is a long time</p>
<p> </p>
<p>After three years of separation, we'll finally get to meet.<br/>And I'm going to miss you so much.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Three Long Years

**Author's Note:**

> Jadekat series, The tags will probably change a little as the fic goes on but i'll leave a warning in the chapter notes if they do.  
> There will be a few time jumps back and forth so beware  
> Feel free to leave comments if you find any mistakes or things that you might do a little differently, if if you just want to comment on the fic :) i wont bite :P

CG: SO YOUR WHOLE UNIVERSE IS BASICALLY FUCKED, YEAH?

GG: yeah pretty much :(

CG: DAMMIT

CG: FUCK

CG: IM SORRY

GG: karkat you have nothing to be sorry for! Its not your fault!

CG: YES JADE, YES IT FUCKING IS. IF I HAD JUST LISTENED TO KANAYA AND DONE EVRYTHING PROPERLY THIS WOULDN’T HAVE TO HAPPEN.

GG: yeah but it kind of had to happen anyway karkat

CG: LIKE FUCK IT DID

GG: well think of it this way! When its all over, we can all meet up and hang out!

CG: YEAH I GUESS

CG: BUT

GG: stop typing

GG: right now don’t even finish that next sentence

GG: it was all inevitable anyway ok

GG: and when this is over we’ll all hang out and do cool stuff together!

CG: LIKE WHAT

GG: I don’t know! Just

GG: stuff!

CG: YEAH, I GUESS

CG: THEY’VE BEEN SAYING THREE YEARS THOUGH HARLEY

GG: three years huh?

CG: YEAH

GG: that sure is a long time

CG: YEAH A LONG TIME I DON’T HAVE TO PUT UP WITH YOUR RENENTLESS YAPPING.

GG: yeah and a long time I don’t have to put up with your constant yelling!!

CG: YEAH I GUESS WE BOTH WIN OUT ON THAT ONE.

CG: BUT

CG: YEAH

CG: IM SORRY.

GG: what are you sorry for?

CG: FOR BEING MY USUAL DOUCHELORD SELF.

CG: BUT THREE YEARS IS A HELL OF A LONG TIME HARLEY.

CG: ITS LIKE, IF IM RIGHT

CG: A SWEEP AND A HALF ALMOST

CG: AND THAT MIGHT NOT MEAN MUCH TO YOU BUT THAT IS A REALLY FUCKNIG LONG TIME

GG: I know I know

GG: but hey! You have dave and rose to keep you company! Plus all the other trolls!!

GG: and ill have john and davesprite and all the consorts from our planet! :D

CG: YOU MAKE THAT SOUND LIKE A GOOD THING

CG: I HOPE YOU KNOW IT REALLY ISNT

GG: oh relax! Dave and rose aren’t that bad!

CG: CORRECT ME IF I’M WRONG HARLEY, BUT YOU’VE NEVER MET THEM.

CG: I HAVE LITERALLY SEEN THEIR ENTIRE TIMELINES AND YES, THEY REALLY ARE THAT BAD.

GG: well if you say so

GG: though to be honest

GG: im really gonna miss you karkat! :(

CG: I

CG: YEAH

CG: ME TOO

CG: MISS YOU, I MEAN

GG: :)

GG: I gotta go

GG: theyre starting up the scratch now

GG: I gotta you know

GG: rise to the godtiers and all that

GG: so

GG: I guess ill see you

CG: YEAH JUST

CG: BE REALLY CAREFUL JADE

GG: I will

GG: and you too!

GG: don’t do anything stupid!!

CG: LIKE ID EVER DO ANYTHING STUPID

GG: …

CG: SHUT UP

GG: ok I gotta go

GG: goodbye karkat!

CG: YEAH. SEE YOU IN THREE YEARS.

 

\-- gardenGnostic [GG] ceased pestering carcinoGeneticist [CG] at ??:?? --

 

 

* * *

Years in the future... but not many...

 

* * *

 

 

Cold, stale air rushes into your lungs as you’re sent reeling from the dream bubbles and crashing back into the world of the living. You sit there for a moment, doing nothing but breathing before you scramble to your feet and bolt out of the conservatory door. The glistening gold hallways engulf your body as you shoot yourself through them, headed back to your own room on the ship. You had to get to your computer, you had to see if it was true. Unlike the days before the game was scratched, you don’t carry five computers on you at any one time, which makes matters such as this all the more convenient. As a matter of fact, you currently only own one computer in total.

Nevertheless, you had to get to it. You have just received some very important news.

You see, in the dream bubbles, you had found yourself lost, wandering. All alone, not a human nor troll in sight. That is however, until just a few moments before you woke up.

A Dave had appeared in front of you. You aren’t sure which Dave, or from what timeline, you just know that he was wearing his Godtier outfit; but what he’d told you was important.

You skid to a stop at your door, your red shoes a blur against the gold floor. After dashing inside, you slam you hand down on the power button on your computer. Though it is up and running within about a minute, it still feels like an agonizingly slow minute. Pesterchum pops up as soon as your desktop loads and you scroll through your contacts. John’s online, Davesprite’s online, about seventy three thousand nakodiles are online, and sure enough, there it is. Lit up and online, a name you haven’t seen in about three years.

 

   _carcinoGeneticist_

 

 

* * *

 

 

You have to get john.

Davesprite is flying around somewhere. You called to him and messaged him, so hopefully he should show up soon, but John is down on LOWAS. You don’t bother to contact him, you think you’ll just zap him back up here without warning. You don’t care what he’s doing. Even if he’s pissing.

Okay you take that back, you would not like to zap up john whilst he’s pissing that’d be bad and gross and _very_ weird. Though regardless of the dangers, you zap him up anyway and hope for the best.

Thankfully, he’s not pissing, but he does look very confused and doesn’t seem to be pleased with being brought back up here so suddenly without warning.

‘Jade what the-‘

‘We’re here!’ you cut him off.

‘What do you mean we’re-‘

‘We’re here john! Three years is up! It’s time to land this thing!’ The boy’s eyes widen and a grin smears itself across his face. Before he can speak another word, Davesprite pops his head through the porthole window.

‘Yo, what’d I miss?’

‘Three years is up!’ john exclaims.

‘Yeah, wow really? You think I didn’t know that? Remember who you’re talking to here.’

Despite the sarcasm, he slinks through the tiny window and joins the two of you in preparing for landing the ship. You are so ready for the new universe and you cannot wait to meet up with your friends for the first time ever. You didn’t think it was possible to miss a bunch of people you’d never met quite as much as you do. 

 

 

* * *

 

 

You’re about to go to sleep when the online friend count rises on your Trollian window. You drop yourself back into the desk chair you just had your ass half-removed from and let your tired eyes adjust to the unfamiliar colours on the screen. You have to blink a few times, to try and get your eyes into focus, and to see if you’re just imagining it. And as it turns out, you’re not. You step out of your chair and roll it backwards in one swift movement and head to the nearest transportilizer pad, all thoughts of sleep abandoned.

The others had to know about the two contacts that had just come online for the first time in a sweep and a half.

 

_gardenGnostic  
ectoBiologist_

 

 

* * *

 

 

The ship landed safely, but far from successfully. You don’t know where you are.

Out on the ship’s deck, all you can see is rock and darkness. No plants or signs of life at all, no stars or light in the sky. Nothing. Just rock and void. Nothing for miles.

If this is the new universe you had all created, then you had most certainly fucked up.

John and Davesprite come rushing out to see the new planet. You had been really happy for Davesprite. He’d been so down since the two of you broke up, but lately, since this whole thing was coming to an end, he’d cheered up so much, to the point of even showing his little trademark strider smirk. But now, on both Davesprite and John’s faces, is just a look of disappointment and despair.

‘Did we land in the wrong place?’ john asks, sounding hopeful.

‘I don’t think so.’ You say, your mouth dry.

‘It’s not here. The new universe it’s not even fucking here.’ And with that, Davesprite took off and retreated back to the ship. After that, you and john just argue for a while about everything. It’s all kind of just a blur. He’s angry, and he has the right to be, so despite what he says, you’re careful with what you say back. In the end, he just gives up and flies back up onto the ship. Left alone, you stomp around for a bit, pull your hair, rub your eyes, and kick around few of the useless empty space rocks before dropping down onto a rock and holding your hands over your face. You don’t cry, but you just sit there in your frustration, trying to let it all out.

You don’t know where to go from here. You’re practically stuck. You’ll never see your old friends again, or well, it’s not like you ever met them in the first place. Dave and Rose, and not to mention all the trolls too. You remember Tavros, and Feferi, and a bunch of all the others. When Tavros tried to confess his love to you, and when Feferi told you about the dream bubbles, with all her fish puns, and then there was that troll who was all “ _science”_ and wanted something from you. And then there was that other one…

Yeah, then there was…

Behind you, you hear footsteps. John must have come back down to see you, or to just kick around some rocks like you did. You turn your head just enough to see movement. The absolute emptiness of the void out here makes everything completely silent, so it’s quiet enough for you to hear John take a deep breath, as if he were about to speak.

But instead of hearing words, you hear a series of clicks and grunts.

You stand and turn fully to see that it’s not john at all. Your eyes are greeted by grey skin and yellow horns and such sharp, sharp yellow eyes above a mouth hanging open over a set of dangerously pointy teeth. You can’t help but stare open mouthed for a moment.

‘Karkat…?’ you dare to ask, cautiously so. And he speaks again, no clicks, not even a trace of a foreign accent.

‘Jade?’

And that is when you step towards him, stumbling, almost desperately. You throw your arms around his shoulders and pull him tight into a desperate hug. For a second, he goes rigid, but then slowly wraps his arms around you. You pull back, hands still on his upper arms, and look at him. Remembering that glimpse you caught of him when you and john had sent the bucket message, and noticing how different he looked.

Then, he had had short, messy black hair that stood up on all the wrong angles. And his eyes, from the distance you’d seen them, had just been like normal human eyes, but with a hint of yellow. He had been short, much shorter than the troll girl rose had been talking to (Whom you had assumed to be Kanaya,) by at least a head, and all stocky and stumpy.

Now, his hair was pretty much the same. Not any better than before and you can’t help but smile a little at that. Some things just never change, and Karkat’s lifelong streak of never so much as touching a hairbrush seemed to be one of those things. His eyes however, either you hadn’t seen them well enough before, or they’ve changed a lot since. His irises were no longer yellow, but a stunning gold with darker streaks threaded through the veins of his irises. And where his eyes should be white, was a similarly brilliant Yellow. And his pupils, they didn’t look human at all. They were like the eyes of a cat in half-light, with the split shape, but rounded out more in the middle. His overbite was gone, though if anything his teeth looked sharper, and he was now as tall as you, maybe taller, and he was all thin and bony, and for a split second you wonder if he’s been eating right. He looks so different, so _alien_. But he still looks like Karkat. He still looks like you’re old friend.

‘You look different,’ is all you can manage. He lets out a little breathy huff.

‘Speak for yourself,’ he says as his eyes run from your eyes to your feet before settling back onto the ears on top of your head. His voice is sharp, and holds the slight taste of an accent you can’t quite place. You let out a light chuckle and one of your hands moves to one of the ears on top of your head. You use the same hand to brush the hair out of your face and the two of you just stare at each other, flicking your gaze from one eye to the other, noticing how real you both are. Taking each other in.

You gasp and jump back.

‘The others!’ your hands cover your mouth. ‘Wait right here! I’ll go get them!’

With a running leap, you shoot up back onto the ship to round up the other two.

Though after a good quarter of an hour of searching and rounding the two of them up, you return to find Karkat isn’t there when you get back.

 

 

* * *

 

Like fuck you were just going to wait around for a bunch of people you barely know. You are going to avoid all awkward encounters brought about by this dumb reunion thing like the plague. Don’t get me wrong, you’re going back, you’re just scrounging up the others first. You’re not dealing with this by yourself.

‘ _They’re here! I found Jade and she’s getting the others! They’re here!’_ you yell as soon as you get into the main room you all usually hang around in.

‘Vantas, you know I don’t understand your screeching. Speak _normally._ ’ Dave never really got the hang of Alternian, always preferring to tell you to shut up rather than try to process what you’ve said.

‘Shut the fuck up, Strider.’

‘ _What were you saying Karkat?’_ Kanaya comes rushing in, Rose tailing behind her.

‘ _They’re here. I told you time was up. They’re here right fucking now.’_

‘Pardon? I didn’t catch that.’ Rose asks.

‘Jade, john,’ you say. ‘They’re here.’

Her eyes widen. ‘Take me to them.’

‘Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, hang on a sec, John and Jade?’

‘Yes, fuck nuts, now let’s go!’

And with that, you turn and quickly climb the ladder and make your way back out to the surface of the meteor.

 

 

* * *

 

‘This isn’t funny Jade.’

John followed you down to the surface, but Davesprite stayed back up on deck, watching. With Karkat’s sudden disappearance, he believes you’re trying to play a joke on them.

‘He was here! I’m serious!’ you can’t blame him for being pissed. He’s just disheartened, he was expecting the new universe to be so great and so much better than anything you’d seen so far. Though you are starting to lose your patience with him and his negativity, not just since the landing but before as well.

‘Look, I’m going back onto the ship, could you send me back to LOWAS?’

‘John no, they’re here I-‘

And as if on cue, you hear the same kind of speech you heard before. The all three of you turn towards it and you notice Davesprite duck down behind the railing on the deck. Suddenly, some more familiar faces come into view.

‘HEY YO EGBERT!’

‘Dave..?’

‘Get your windy blue ass over here and give your best bro a hug,’ Dave stops, predicting John’s body leaping towards him before it happened.

‘Dave! And Rose!’ and then he leapt towards Rose with his opened arms.

‘Hey Harley, don’t I get a bro-hug too?’

You crack a smile and make your way towards him. He pulls you into his arms and your head just goes right under his chin. Wow, he got tall.

‘Nice jammies, nerd.’ You say when he lets you go.

‘Dude, no, these aren’t just _jammies_ these, my friend, are the ultimate strider jammies of _power._ ’

You laugh and pull away before he can even think about continuing his little spiel. One of the last times you’d seen Dave, he’d been dead. Killed by the bullets you’d fired yourself. You remember shaking over his dead body as you tried to bring yourself to kiss him and awaken his dream-self. Seeing him now was like seeing the sun after years of being shut away from it, unsure whether or not it was still burning.

‘It’s good to finally meet you Jade.’ Says Rose, and you aren’t sure whether you should offer her a hug or not. The two of you weren’t really that close, at least as close as you were with the other two. Regardless, you dare to open your arms and she allows herself into them. As soon as she does, you instantly notice that she does smell really very nice.

‘It’s so good to see you all!’ you say, no longer able to supress the splitting grin on your face.

‘Oh, Jade, John,’ says rose. ‘This is Kanaya.’

‘An absolute pleasure to meet you.’ She says, offering her hand. She has the same kind of accent as Karkat, but her words are more pronounced. Though before either of you can respond, a loud voice calls out from far behind the group.

‘HEY! YOU GUYS FORGOT ME!!’

The voice had a much, _much_ stronger accent. Much sharper, and all the words seemed to be all clumsily pronounces and just sounded as though they’d been all smooshed together. Honestly, it seemed to sound a lot more like screeching than speaking.

‘Yo, TZ, hurry the fuck up!’ Dave called towards a figure hauling themselves out of some kind of hole in the ground. The figure yelled something in that strange other language and scurried over.

‘I heard Karkat yell out but when I came in to see what was going on, You’d all already left!’ she puffed, pouting and crossing her arms across her chest.

‘John and Jade, this is my homegirl Terezi. Don’t let her lick you.’ The girl let out a horrendous cackle accompanied with an enormous grin filled with teeth that were definitely much bigger and sharper than Karkat’s. The lot of you exchanged various pleasantries and began asking questions about what had happened, before you remembered another friend in need of an introduction.

‘Wait guys,’ you start. You turn back to the ship. ‘Hey!’ you see him duck his head below the covered railings.

‘Wait, what?’ asked Karkat.

‘Davesprite! Come down!’ the Dave beside you let out a chuckle.

‘Hey, its bird me!’ he called up towards his sprite-self. ‘Get your feathery asshole down here right now, gotta see how much you’ve been defiling the name of Dave Strider!’ you had expected Davesprite to back off, but instead, his voice rang out after Dave’s own.

‘Can’t have done it any worse than you have.’ And the Alpha Dave lets out a chuckle.

‘Davesprite, come down here! Everyone wants to say hello!’ you call.

‘Hey! It’s been a while bird Dave!’ Terezi half-shrieks. You should have figured that they would have all spoken before, somewhere along Dave’s timeline.

After a lot of coaxing, he eventually leaves his hiding places and joins you all on the ground. Dave and John hit it off like wildfire and are quickly shoving conversation down each other’s throats whilst Terezi mostly grins excitedly from the side. Rose and Kanaya strike up conversation with you whilst Karkat and Davesprite seem to just stand around (or rather float, in Davesprite’s case) on the sidelines. Suddenly Dave decides to drag john with him back “inside” and is trying to coax everyone else along with him. He gets halfway to the spot Terezi had climbed out of and calls back to Davesprite, inviting him to join, with Terezi frantically agreeing after him. Davesprite shoots you a wary look before you smile and gesture for him to “go along” which, though hesitantly, he does. Quckly after they disappear, Rose and Kanaya kind of drift in the same direction, still chatting, leaving you alone with Karkat again. You let out a smile, and by the looks of it, he can’t help but smile back.

‘Three years, huh?’ he says.

‘Yeah. It’s been a really long time Karkat.’

The two of you kind of just awkwardly look at each other and laugh.

‘C’mon,’ he says with a flip of his hand. ‘I’ll show you around.’


End file.
